Mark Frost Discuss Latest Novel ‘Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier’

Variety interviews the co-creator of ABC ‘Twin Peaks’ Mark Frost to discuss his newly release novel ‘Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier’ and his partnership with director David Lynch.

According to the book’s official synopsis, “Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier tells us what happened to key characters in the twenty-five years in between the events of the first series and the second, offering details and insights fans will be clamoring for. ”

You can read a snippet of Frost’s interview with Variety below:

There aren’t a lot of antecedents for TV series that involve huge amounts of mythology to have follow-up books that both wrap up loose character plotlines and explain some of the mysteries, at least from one of the creators. Can you think of any others like yours? The creators of “Lost” never wrote “Lost: A Final Wrap-up from the Island,” and we never got “The Prisoner: What the Hell Just Happened?”

[Laughs] None comes to mind. No, honestly, this may be sort of a one-off.

There was recently an interview with the producer of the series who said that she and David had not read the book yet. Did some of the things that are in the book come from back story that you and David came up with for the series that you just didn’t ultimately work into the script, or was you arriving at all this additional material a matter of: “Mark, we trust you, come up with whatever you want — it’s okay by us”?

I think it’s a little bit of both. David and I talked for a year before we ever started working, so there’s no doubt that some of those ideas [in the new book] came up during that period of time. But also, you know, it was [me saying], “David, you go make the show, and do what you do best, and I’m gonna do that with the books.” So you have to trust your partner.

When the idea of reviving the series still seemed like a pipe dream, did you think of writing books like these, as novelistic sequels or prequels in their own right?

Yeah, I had thought of writing whatever turned into “The Final Dossier” as early as 1991, I think, when we were conceiving and producing the first three books that we did. [There were actually four official spin-off books or audiobooks produced in 1990-91, none directly written by Frost or Lynch.] I had this in the back of my mind. At that point I hadn’t really started a publishing career yet; that happened after “Twin Peaks.” I felt that after 12 books, I was ready to write “The Secret History.” It dovetailed perfectly with what we were doing with the show, and I thought would make a great companion piece, as a way of expanding the Twin Peaks universe for folks, extending it back in time, and also in terms of interior spaces. And I was always thinking, well, then I’m gonna need to write a second book. because there was so much I wasn’t able to address in the first one, because I didn’t want to give anything away about what was coming in “The Return.”